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Thursday, 5 April 2018

This weekend, I planned and booked a bank holiday weekend
away to Devon with my housemate from New Zealand, who has never been
before.So naturally being in the UK on
a bank holiday it rained.

But we didn’t let that stop us. As you can see.

Now it was little more than a flying visit, as I only had
two days left of my bank holiday after a day at the beach on Friday and a day
in Cambridge Saturday (where incidentally Stephen Hawkins funeral was also
happening). But we still managed to
squeeze a fair bit in.

We were staying in a place called Compton in a beautiful home hosted by Jo and Jason, where Ollie was more than welcome with us and we
enjoyed a beautiful dinner with them on the first night after arriving back
from the beach a couple of drowned rats.

Paignton beach where we had been that day would be a
glorious place to be on a nice sunny day, however, Sunday was not that day and
we got absolutely soaked.

On the Monday things were looking up and the rain wasn’t due
to arrive until lunchtime.So we jumped
out of bed that morning and mad our way out to catch the steam train to
Dartmouth with the dog.

Ollie wasn’t too sure about it all at first, but he soon
settled down and we were soon on the ferry on the final part of the crossing.

While we were there we stopped for a late breakfast and
early lunch before finding some dairy free fudge and getting back on the ferry
before the rain arrived.

Luckily we managed to avoid the rain all day though and
arrived in Brixham to some beautiful weather, where our wonderful Airbnb hosts
have a stunning little shop along the front.Flotsam 50 is Jo and Jason’s wonderful shop, where we
stopped for some tea and cake and obviously to shop!

Ollie has a rather mouldy and fake sheepskin at home which
marks where he is and isn’t allowed to lay outside of his dog bed, so as a
treat I bought him a lovely new and real sheepskin from Flotsam 50 along with
some wonderful smelling soaps.My
favourite is most definitely the one that smells like a bakewell tart!

After spending a little money in the shop, we made our way
to the Breakwater and the lighthouse at the end and Ollie loved looking over
the edge and jumping in the water with the other dogs.

It was then getting late and time to make the 4 hour journey
home before I was falling asleep at the wheel, but minus a few pit stops for
Ollie to stretch his legs, he did so well all weekend with everyone and
everything that was going on around him and we had a great weekend introducing
him to lots of new things!

Tuesday, 3 April 2018

It's taken me a while to write this post, as rehoming Ollie back in December has meant my time has been taken up by amazing dog walks, cuddles on the sofa, chronic diahorrea and some occasional destruction of my home!

I am going to throw it out there and say the thing you aren't supposed to say, because as much as I love Ollie, a few days in I was thinking to myself "what have I done" and I had the same conversation with another guy in the pet shop today, about his 18 month old pup too. Owning a dog is hard work, it isn't all cute photos of puppies that you see online, so if you really want to get a puppy, make sure you are ready for all the rough that comes with the good!

I rehomed Ollie around Christmas from a couple who really had bitten off more than they could chew and from there on out, we had countless trips to the vets with a sensitive tummy, which cost a fortune and left Ollie with still a poorly tummy! Eventually, after switching to an independent vet surgery and getting a raw food diet recommendation, all was resolved and we haven't had any issues or cause to go back to the vet since. Which, yes is great news for my poor bank balance, but also for poor Ollie, who was so poorly and dropping weight so quickly I didn't know what else to do.

He now weighs a very healthy 15kgs and is growing into the perfect little dog/teenager that has selective hearing, unless there is a food treat involved!

With the hardest part behind us now (hopefully) we have been making the most of getting outdoors and I love seeing him enjoy something new all the time.

So here are some of my favourite photos of our adventures together over the last few months.

So if you are thinking about getting a dog, please think carefully about it and make sure you have some savings to fall back on when things don't go as planned!

Other things to remember are:

Pet Insurance

Puppies grow quickly

Training

Socialising with other puppies and dogs is important

Your support system (everyone is ready to tell you "you can't do it", but you will need one friend that will remind you, you can!)

There will be accidents and you will want to cry, but it will get better and easier!

Monday, 18 December 2017

When I first started writing this blog, I was at University and as my interests have developed so has this blog, but originally it was set up to talk about ad campaigns that I loved and today I thought it would be nice to write a bit of a retrospective about a campaign that I have had the pleasure of working on at my new agency.

One of my new and very exciting clients is Vitality and recently they have given women the amazing opportunity to get back into sport!

This is a topic that I am particularly passionate about, as when I was at school while I loved sport I hated PE, it was never a positive experience and that was mainly due to the delightful PE knickers that we had to wear, but also because for some reason girls don't have the same energy for sports as boys do at that age.

Playing sports at school didn't have the camaraderie that boys sports teams seemed to have at the same age, but I still loved it enough to take it as an option when it came to my GCSE's.

When I left school I didn't give sports a second thought and my main form of cardio was dancing the night away every Friday night, as every other teenager passed the age of 18 all seemed to be doing too.

But after a years worth of traveling, I made the choice to go to University and during the freshers fair, two very excited girls came up to me and encouraged me to join the netball team.

**Now I will caveat here, that what I lack in skill I make up for in enthusiasm and I loved every second of my 4 years at University being a part of my netball family. In fact one of our proudest achievements was going undefeated all year (even Loughborough University couldn't beat us), we eventually went on to win Varsity and then committee of the year in my final year and I couldn't have been more proud of our achievements as a team.

What I love most about this group of girls though, is the way we all lift each other up and make each other better! At uni we spent late nights awake helping each other with dissertations and spent free time organising additional tournaments, team holidays and social activities.

Since leaving university, this family of ladies hasn't left me, we have been together through internships, new jobs, heart breaks, weddings and now as we get older 30th Birthdays!

So you can see why this campaign has been a huge love of mine.

As part of #TeamVitality I had the opportunity to take some time out to visit Scotland a few weeks ago, with some other lovely ladies, where we climbed Arthur's seat and met the Women's Scottish Rugby team all thanks to Vitality.

We had a fabulous time as you can see from the photos, and a great day weatherise to climb all the way to the top (even if it did take nearly two hours)!

Now as you can imagine, meeting the Rugby team was amazing, but this Friday I was also able to go and watch England netball play in the Copperbox at Stratford in London and I was in my element.

You can find more pictures over on my Instagram account if you are looking for some more inspiration!

If you want to find out more about the Women In Sport Campaign, or getting back into sport, you can do so over onVitality's website here.